A poison arrow. A prophecy of two sisters. A journey into the heart of the resistance.

While Isika is preparing for her future role with the Maweel, members of the Karee tribe come to ask for help with the problem of masses of disappearing people. Meanwhile, Aria grows weaker daily from the poison arrow lodged inside her, and time seems to be growing short.

A disturbing Karee prophecy might contain more answers, and as Aria is pulled deeper into the Desert King's trap, Isika races to find a healer who might be able to save her sister. In the most dangerous places, she finds more help than she expected, and the group of friends grows and changes as the Resistance enfolds them all.

Isika has resisted the power of the Desert King, but will Aria fall under his sway?

The weather is growing cooler and the nights are lovely. I’ve started lighting a candle by my bed in the evenings, so I can sit and journal in a tiny pool of light. I’m trying to be kind and hopeful. I’m trying to learn to rest.

Today there is an unseasonal rain, which is annoying and beautiful. Annoying because we have just come out of the rainy season and were excited about the sun, beautiful because no rain is wasted on this earth, especially if the river is not too full. A few more rains in the garden are more effective than our pitiful hoses can ever be.

My heart is full. There is so much fear and worry, so much happiness and excitement about the future. So much love I can barely stand it. So much sorrow for the world and all our old systems and institutions that are steeped in selfishness and fear. I think it’s okay to walk through the world with a heart that is full like this. It is not comfortable, but in a way I don’t have to change anything. I can feel all those feelings, one after another, all day long. (“No feeling is final,” as Rilke says.)

I offer them to God like stones, as I come across them. “Here,” I say, holding my hand out. “I found another one.”

We’re back at school and I have new kids coming to read and write together. They are welcome. To have the peers we need for our kids, we basically just have to throw our doors open. Right now we’re doing a workshop, writing a story together. It’s so fun. These kids are creative and quirky, so brainstorming sessions are the absolute best.

I’m busy, so these quiet moments in the morning and night are the most important ones. Soon Isaac will trip into my studio and ask me to make him a cup of tea. I’ll get up and do it, and then I’ll find that the kitchen is messier than I like and I’ll clean up. I’ll make a smoothie and remember that I need to make the kids’ homeschool charts. Then I’ll think about dinner and what to buy for that. And we’ll roll into the day and a thousand conversations. Surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses. Somewhere right now, the city of the Living God, thousands of angels in joyful gathering. A consuming fire.

And a bowl of cereal, little boy, cup of tea, dog who needs to be fed. Life is so interesting.

Morning is light and cool air, cup of coffee, more edits. When I walk into the studio I light some incense and pray for God’s words and thoughts in me and through me all day long. The studio is messier than it should be. I am a messy artist, not a neat one, my mind is not tidy and neither is my workspace. I wish it was, but even if the space is not beautiful, beautiful things happen here.

We had an amazing conference last week. Introvert and sensory person that I am, I have needed some recuperation time, even though the conversations were lovely and the thoughts were deep. We were at a resort in Chiang Mai, which is a sort of floating space, not real life. Taking food from trays, not washing dishes.

Back at home I drove to the market yesterday and on the way I saw an old friend who has moved to Australia. She used to work with her sister and mother at the noodle shop that is my second home. She waved me down and I hopped off the motorbike and hugged her. Her sister, whom I see several times a week, came and slipped her hand into mine and said “Rachel is my little sister now.” We clucked over one another, me over how big her little boy is, what Australia is like, and her over how tall my children are. (None of us can believe it, I hardly go out without someone remarking that they saw my son or daughter and couldn’t believe their eyes.)

At the market, there were more friends. We talked and squeezed hands and touched each others arms. I bought things for salad (these greens are so beautiful, my friend said) and many bananas. I went to the laundry place later (I came home to find that my washer is broken) and told the lady that I had been away for a week and that was why I had enormous bags of laundry. “I know,” she told me. “Brendan has already been here to pick up his laundry and Christy has not come yet.” We talked about the best repair person in town.

All of these things are links to here. Each neighbor, each smile. In this place there are one hundred kinds of smiles. Kind ones, cheeky ones from the motorbike, apologetic ones, ones that relieve tension.

My landlords brought Wookie back after watching her for the week and she tore around in circles, yipping. My househelper brings her daughter over every day because it is term break for school. Yupa is four years old and a delight. Whenever Isaac comes to tell me something, she is right behind him, telling me a story in Thai, so that I have two kids talking to me at once in two different languages.

Sometimes being a mother feels like being a nucleus, with different people whirling around with positive and negative charges of different intensity. Joe came over as well yesterday, a twelve-year-old friend. Later another friend, Siam came. And then our Japanese friends. And my landlord. So there they all were, each coming to talk for a few moments at a time. The teenagers. The dog. The little kids who spoke with words tumbling over one another. All linking me to the world, keeping me from floating off. God hemming me in behind and before.

Later I bought a canvas at an art store, ready to paint during my friend Leaf’s beautiful Devotion Circle. I found some white orchids and bought them too. Small conversations in each place. I went to get petrol and found the basket men sitting at the petrol station. One of them saw me and his eyes lit up. He walked toward me with his basket while I was taking the lid off the chariot’s petrol tank. He held a beautiful type of basket, hard to find around here, so when people come selling them, I usually buy one. (They’re nice and large and I use them for hampers—they slowly fall apart over time.) We chatted about price and I talked him down a bit. We joked back and forth. He went to get change for me, and I talked with the gas station attendants. “How much would you pay?” I asked. “You got a good price,” they told me. “Those are rattan, and handmade.”

When he came back I gave him his original price. He ginned, the gas station attendants smiled, and he gave a little skip as he walked off. The light was very beautiful, then, making the trees glow as I drove over the bridge and up the hill in the chariot, my side-car holding one canvas, one basket, and dozens of small, shining moments.

Isaac and Jazzy helped me push the chariot down to the bike mechanic when it wouldn’t start, then sat back and had an old man chat.

The past week has been very full. Full of tears and hugs, much joy, many friends.

(Also a lot of news. I follow it, I weep for it, my heart goes out to victims of sexual harassment. There is so much brokenness in this world, so many sins against the body, the spirit of our most vulnerable people. God help us to change, to show compassion and understanding.)

First, we successfully surprised Chinua on his birthday. It was worth every moment of preparation to see the look on his face. After Devotion Circle, we managed to get everyone back from the garden and gathered at our house, and it was Ro’s job to somehow get him to come back. After some moments of trying to figure out what they were going to do, Chinua suggested coming back to our house to drop instruments off.

Because it was his suggestion, he was floored when he arrived and out of the dark came a little Happy birthday composition, featuring a few guitars, the piano and a clarinet.

I’ll remember the look on his face forever.

At the moment we have a gathering of communities from around this part of the world; mainly the other Shekina communities in India and a community from Israel. We’ve been praying, singing, and eating together. Yesterday we had a circle on the theme of friendship with God and friendship with each other.

I’m a strong believer of friendship first, a belief I have come to after a lot of trial and error. You know that thing where you look at your spouse as a person to blame because they are like a business partner in the business of your home and family and they have not met your expectations? Yes, I know that thing. In hardship I have a tendency for flipping between outward blame and self loathing. Neither are necessary. Blame and self loathing are both tactics to try to get the bad feelings away.

You can just feel them. The sadness, the grief, the fear. And put friendship first, learn to go through things together. People in the circle shared about their experiences with friendship, and it was inspiring.

Next week we go down to Chiang Mai for a bigger gathering of communities from around the world. I’m also going to be hard at work on the final edit of Demon’s arrow, which comes out in less than three weeks! I’m very happy to share it with you.